Friday 25th May, 2012

Hen was home last night and she and I settled to an exciting evening in front of the telly after a barbeque and two bottles of Pino Grigio Rosato. What a fascinating programme we watched about Billingsgate Fish Market. I think I've told you before about my attitude to fish and fishing. It is definitely at odds with Bob's. Apart from the smell, the tangles and the danger to body posed by hooks, gaffs, knifes and teeth, not to mention the risk of ciguatera, it is also the fact that I am incredibly unlucky and rarely catch any of the little blighters. My luck changed once though. It was many years ago, pre dating any influence from Bob, we were staying in Ireland in a house on the shore of some sea inlet on the West Coast and I decided to have a go at catching supper. Would you believe it within 20 minutes I had pulled out four or five substantial and I must say, quite attractive looking fish. Manfully, I gutted and filleted them, wrapped them in tin-foil and put them on the barbeque. I can't tell you how utterly disgusting it was. Tasted like eating mud. In an effort to identify the fish, the next day I went to a shop in Sneem and described them to the shop keeper. "Oh they'll have been the pollock" the man said. "Are they edible" I asked? "Oh yes" came the enthusiastic reply. "They used to be very popular here in Ireland.....during the Potato Famine." Well funnily enough one of the fish merchants on the TV last night told us that thanks to celebrity chefs likeGordon Ramsay and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall pollock has become incredibly popular and he can hardly give cod away these days despite its abundant supply. At that point I almost switched the telly off in disgust, but a moment later I could have hugged him. "That's a pollock," he says, holding one up. "Lovely piece of fish, lovely bright colours, that sort of thing. Tastes like sh*t. Then you get cod [holds up a cod]. That's a fish that's been swimming in the North Atlantic, feeding on the right products, since the day it was born. If that's a human being, that goes to the gym every day, yeah? It eats all the right foods. It probably drives a Porsche, right? This – back to the pollock dangling limply in his hand – is sitting at home on the settee, in a tracksuit, watching Jeremy Kyle, eating a burger." Well I thought it was hilarious, but I suppose it boils down to one's history with pollock and your sense of humour which can be like ships passing in the night....witness a couple of Blackberry exchanges I had with my daughter Jimmy this week: David Sandison, Jimmy Sandison NEW Messages: --------- David Sandison: My auntie died this morning Jimmy Sandison NEW: Oh daddy I'm so sorry are you ok? Jimmy Sandison NEW: Who's sister was she David Sandison: I didn't know her well. She never talked to me, or to anyone really David Sandison: R.I.P. Auntie Social David Sandison: Ha ha ha!!! Jimmy Sandison NEW: Oh golly ok David Sandison: It was a joke!! Sorry. Couldn't resist it!!! David Sandison: Do you get it?? Jimmy Sandison NEW: What no one died? Jimmy Sandison NEW: U sick freak David Sandison: Did u know that Beyonce is Roy Castle's love child? She chose not to take his name as she didn't want to be known as Beyonce Castle. Boom boom! Jimmy Sandison NEW: Isn't he a music producer? Or something Jimmy Sandison NEW: Very interesting David Sandison: Do u get the joke? Bouncy castle. Jimmy Sandison NEW: Why have u taste in jokes gone so down hill Jimmy Sandison NEW: I've gone deaf in one ear Jimmy Sandison NEW: Completely David Sandison: What? Didn't quite hear you David Sandison: Poor you. When did this happen? Jimmy Sandison NEW: Last night I think it was cos I was spinning around loads so my balance in my ears have gone weird David Sandison: Try spinning back the other way?? Jimmy Sandison NEW: That's what I thought but I'm not gunna risk it cos I can't remember which way I spun in the first place

Friday 4th May, 2012

Here's a strange one. A couple of days after being asked by his old University if they could give my father's telephone number out to someone who wanted to make contact with him, my mother answered the phone to a lady calling herself Moira asking to speak to Ian ( my father ). My parents have been happily married for 50 years, but my mother's hackles were raised. She knew immediately that this was the very Moira, my father's first serious girlfriend, and who had dumped him apparently on the grounds that he was unlikely to convert to Catholicism. You probably havn't met my mother, but she is not to be taken lightly, especially when her hackles are on end. Nonetheless my father took the phone and despite not being the sort to linger on calls ( "have you seen this blinking phone bill" he used to shout at us ) 45 minutes later was still nattering away, reminiscing happily to this lady who, 56 years after they had last talked to each other, had suddenly decided the time was right for a reconciliation. Moira is not the only one susceptible to a bad dose of nostalgia. Just last weekend I was standing in the kitchen listening transfixed to a programme on the radio called Reunion about the handover of Hong Kong back in 1997. It was quite entertaining stuff. Emily Lau hasn't softened a jot. But when they played a recording of the ceremony itself I suddenly found, much to the amusement of Hen who was looking on, that I had tears running down my cheeks! How sad is that. In my defence it was a very emotional event and even Lord Patten admitted that he had to suck polo-mints in an attempt to hold back the tears! And that brings me to Dirk the penguin. This is a story I spotted this week about a pair of tourists in Australia, Rhys Owen Jones, 21, and Keri Mules, 20, from Wales, funnily enough, who admitted the theft of Dirk from Sea World on Queensland's Gold Coast, when they appeared before Brisbane magistrates. The pair broke into Sea World, swam with dolphins and let off a fire extinguisher in a shark enclosure before setting off back to their hotel with Dirk, a fairy penguin, under their arms. Wacky. Happily Dirk was rescued and returned to Sea World unharmed and reunited with his little partner, Peaches. But what has this got to do with my focus on nostalgia? Sadly I never managed to visit Sea World as it does sound like a fun place, but all those years ago when I was a fund manager and ran the Baring Australia Fund - consistently number 1 in the South China Morning Post fund rankings btw - I owned a substantial stake in the marine park which was then listed as a property trust. I never expected too much from my stock picks so you can imagine I was delighted one morning to wander into my office to find the company had reported and the stock was up some 9%. I rang an Ozzie broker - I think it was Simon Poidevin - to find out what in the results had prompted this move. "Mate", came the reply, quick as you like, " havn't you heard? Flipper the dolphin had twins!" Enjoy the Bank Holiday. We have my mother, who needs time to think about things away from Dad, to stay for the weekend. I jest. In fact it is all very exciting. She is bringing down 20 asparagus crowns, a belated birthday present, which hopefully I will be able to plant if the rain ever stops.